242 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



Our seasons are so short and so variable that, though we have 

 demonstrated the practicability of grape culture in the open 

 field, without protection, it will be wise, and probably necessary, 

 in the long run, to plant only the strongest and best, and, where 

 it is not possible to get strong and good vines, to confine our 

 culture to the garden and the few, until we are able to obtain 

 such better plants as can be grown in the field. But not only 

 should the young vines be grown from the most early and pro- 

 lific vines, they should be grown in soil as nearly as possible 

 like that of the vineyard into which you are going to transplant 

 them ; for if the soil of the nursery-bed is moist and rich, and 

 the soil of the vineyard dry and not rich, then will the young 

 vine be pinched in its growth, and, a's all cultivators know, may 

 take on a starved habit which it will not get rid of for years. 

 It would be safer to get your vines out of a soil not quite so 

 good as your vineyard, or at least, not better, and if the soil of 

 your vineyard is strong and inclined to clay, get your vines, if 

 possible, out of similar soil, for if they have thriven in such soil, 

 they will continue to thrive in soil of the same nature. One 

 must remember that such soils require continual stirring to keep 

 them friable, and that such soils, more than all others, are 

 amended by composts to which lime is added rather freely. 



We believe that if strong and healthy vines, which are per- 

 fectly hardy and of free growth, are planted in the vineyard, 

 success will follow the method we have recommended. 



Slender growing vines and those of tender constitution 

 require higher feeding and protection in winter, but the culti- 

 vation of even these, some of them, will become possible with 

 increased skill and experience. We recommend, however, to 

 the novice, only those hardy and free-growing kinds which are 

 sure of success without much of either. 



THE STATE CABINET. 



The State Cabinet of Natural History has received many 

 additions since my last Report. A rapidly increasing interest 

 in its objects and aim is manifest, not only in the frequent 

 contributions to its instructive collection of specimens, but 

 also in the greater influx of visitors, and the preponderance 

 of that class who are eager to inform their minds, and not 

 merely to spend a leisure hour in the vacant contemplation 



